


The Sun and Harbour

by Silverlight8



Category: Dunkirk (2017)
Genre: Future Fic, Hospital Setting, M/M, Post-Canon, implied and canon character death so need to worry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2020-04-24 11:37:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19172491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silverlight8/pseuds/Silverlight8
Summary: Seventy-eight years since George Mills died in the belly of the Moonstone, Peter faces his own death.





	The Sun and Harbour

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MidshipmanWilfrid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MidshipmanWilfrid/gifts).



> Once again, a wonderful beta job by MidshipmanWarburton! I couldn't resist writing for this fandom again... Let a note be made, however, that it's been a while since I looked up the historical period, so there might be a few mistakes. But I tried my best!

    

Decades ago, Peter Dawson lost his best friend.

It’s been seventy-eight years, to be exact, seventy-eight and a half years without him. As he lies on what will probably be his deathbed, in the clinically white hospital with beeping machines surrounding him that won’t let him rest, he thinks of George Mills. His remaining family has already come and gone, his daughters and their husbands and his little grandchildren (not so little anymore, though)—they’ve already said goodbye for good, he could see it in their faces as they left. It was probably what George would have seen in the belly of the Moonstone, on Peter’s own face, had he still been able to see.

It used to hurt, to think of George. He’d lie awake at night in the few years after Dunkirk (at home, at the sea base, everywhere) and on nights where it got especially bad, he’d replay their last conversation over and over and over again. Even after days when he’d been on watch for hours in the bitterly cold Atlantic, on the lookout for U-Boats—when he should have fallen into his bunk and been asleep in seconds—the same memory would start up. He used to think it was like a little film reel in his head: he could even imagine the flickering of the numbers as it counted down, _3-2-1-_ _start_.

He tried to convince himself that it didn’t matter much. As the war went on he knew more people who died, good friends some of them, and nobody was exactly sleeping well when the very real thought of being torpedoed to smithereens was hanging over them. Still, the chance sighting of George’s face was still a bone-deep hurt that never fully went away.

Alone now, in a hospital room lit up with the moonlight seeping through the crack in the curtains, Peter isn’t even able to sit up by himself. By the doctor’s reckoning, his memories should amount to nothing more, at this point, than what’s occurred in the last week. Still, in the distance, he can still see things through the fog of his mind – disconnected thoughts, images, memories that he tries to grip onto but that slip away like a dream – and then, suddenly appearing like a wraith, he sees the Moonstone, bobbing gently on the protected stretch of water in the harbour.

The rest of the image forms around it; the sun catching off the waves, the seabirds wheeling up above in the sky, and then George, sitting at the stern of the boat, in his hand-knitted sweater vest and rolled up shirt sleeves. He’s looking up at the birds, still, unaware of Peter gaping at him through the curtain of memory. He’s smiling.

Peter’s heart catches in his chest, and his knotted hands clutch at each other as he stares ahead. He can see George, riding high in the Moonstone, the sun sparkling in his hair and in his eyes – he can actually _see him_ , for the first time since the end of the war, and this time it doesn’t hurt, not at all. In front of him, on the wooden deck of the Moonstone, Peter struggles for a second to recognize the scene, but eventually it comes to him. July 2nd, the summer before the war started. Peter’s 18th birthday. He knows, now: _4-3-2-1- start_ _._

His heart is speeding up, it feels like, and every moment from that day reels off in his mind so quickly that it almost makes him dizzy, regardless that he’s already lying down. The boat, their first time going out together without permission; George’s smile, which made him ache with happiness when it was directed at him; the slight shake of his hands when George gave him a hug (“A birthday hug,” George had told him, eyes crinkling at the corners, “since I forgot to bring anything else” – but present or no, it had been wonderful); the way they laughed on the floor of the boat when a particularly heavy swell had brought them crashing down, still clutching at each other. The slight sunburn that stretched across both their cheeks once they brought the boat back in and moored it to the dock. George’s whisper of a goodbye kiss. . .

When the memories slow, Peter reaches up with a trembling hand to find that his cheeks are wet. His vision blurs with tears, but before him, the Moonstone stays as clear as ever. _George,_ he thinks, _it’s been so long since I’ve seen you._ His heart squeezes, and beside him, he can hear the heart monitor give a warning beep. _I miss you,_ he thinks almost helplessly. And as he tries to wipe his eyes, George turns towards him, still on the Moonstone, and beams.

Peter gasps aloud. There is no hospital anymore, no hindering machines, no strangely thin blanket – just George, George and his smile and the sun and the sea. When George speaks, Peter feels as if he’s soaring through the sky. “Peter,” he says, and his smile grows impossibly softer, “I haven’t seen _you_ in a good long while.”                                                                                                                                                              

Peter finds it very difficult to talk, but when words do find their way out of his mouth, George understands him perfectly. “I— George, you. . . you’re dead!” He realizes he shouldn’t sound so happy as he says it, but he can’t bring himself to care.                                                                                     

George snorts slightly, but the look in his eyes tells Peter that he doesn’t mind. “Have been for 78 years, mate. Spent most of that time waiting for you to get here.” He shifts on the deck, and Peter is struck by how young he seems – the boy he fell in love with. He feels self-conscious all of the sudden, _old and decrepit and dying_. “None of that, now,” George says suddenly, and Peter is reminded with another start that George can read his thoughts, is _in_ his thoughts. “You saw me die young. I’m just glad it took you a little longer to kick the bucket.” It wrenches a little laugh from Peter’s throat, dry and whispery, and a fresh bout of tears pour down his cheeks. This is his last chance.                                                             

“I always wanted to say,” he gets out, his voice hoarse, and George on the boat frowns slightly, a look that Peter wants off his face immediately. “I wanted to say that I’m sorry – for locking the door.” It’s all he can get out; by the look on his face, the frown clearing like the mist off the freezing water of the north, it’s all George needs.                                                                                                                                                       

“It wasn’t your fault,” he says gently, and continues before Peter can cut him off. “You didn’t know, you were young. You did so many brave things that day, saved so many people – what loss was one seventeen-year-old boy?” He looks away from Peter for the first time, and his smile wavers. Peter reaches out to him, futilely, his heart hammering painfully in his chest. “No, Georgie, no –” _the first time he’s called him that for decades –_ “No. . .” and he pushes forward before his breath can fail him again. “I put your picture in the paper, after we got back from Dunkirk, and they called you a hero, George, a hero, and you deserve it so much. I – you’re worth so much to me, so much more than just a simple seventeen-year-old boy could—” And George is looking at him again, face tilted once more into the sun, and it spurs Peter on, “So much more. Georgie, I – I think I loved you.”  And Peter falters.                                    

But George’s smile is back, lighting up the world like a thousand suns, and he steps toward Peter on the bed, holding out his hand to where Peter had let his drop.

As their hands touch, Peter thinks vaguely that he had never once considered that this might be a hallucination after George had turned and smiled at him. Now there’s no need to wonder; George pulls him up, out of his bed, and before he can bemoan the cold of the hospital room, he’s standing on the deck of the Moonstone, George holding both of his hands, a breeze ruffling his hair. He feels young again, he realizes, and then it strikes him that he is; it’s his 18th birthday, after all. A surprised laugh wrenches from his throat, and George steps close to him at the stern of the boat and kisses him one last time.

It’s only one quick second, and then George pulls away. He’s still close enough that Peter can feel his breath on his lips, and a sudden ache blossoms in his chest. “I loved you, too,” says George, and Peter is suddenly struck with how much he doesn’t want George to go – because he knows that he must, eventually. “I loved you even when I couldn’t see you.”

The ache pulls itself tightly around his heart, and it elicits a sharp gasp. George notices, and pulls in again for another kiss, this time even softer than the first kiss he had ever given him. When they separate, George just looks at Peter, and the look in his eye is something Peter is sure George can see in his own.

“Is it true that they put my picture in the papers?” is what George asks eventually, and Peter lets out a small laugh out of surprise. “You always wanted your name in the newspaper,” he responds. “How could I possibly give up the chance?”                                                                                                                                                                                                    

There’s only so much time left. Peter can see the sky darkening, and they should be mooring soon. George finally releases him, and takes a step back. His hands are in his pockets, his eyes are glimmering, and Peter never wants to forget this moment, no matter what the doctors say will happen. But even as he tries to cement everything in his memory, he knows that everything will be over soon – _too soon!_ George smiles at him, one last time (his eyes are so beautiful), and even as Peter wishes _don’t go_ , the Moonstone curls into the darkness, and he finds himself retreating, lying back in bed, and George’s outline fades in front of him. His vision is blurred out with tears.

The film reel finishes; it spins in the darkness as Peter’s eyes slip closed (he had still been crying).

_1-2-3-4- end_.                                                                                                                                                                                                

  


End file.
